Eric AltermanSlightly more than half of the citizens of this country simply do not care about what those of us in the “reality-based community” say or believe about anything.

Heidi Julavits This much has changed for me in the past few hours, after raging at 51 percent of the people in this country. To be honest, I didn't really care much about the feelings of that 51 percent -- I far more cared about rectifying our terribly tarnished image throughout the world....Now, however, I realize that we have to treat our own country as a foreign country, with whom our relations are strained beyond the point of communication.... I cannot -- cannot -- understand why 51 percent of the people in this country voted for George Bush -- and that is a problem. We need to understand why, and if we understand why, then perhaps our attempts at communication will be more effective.

San Francisco(The whole damn city, except for Bill Quick and Toren Smith)this link has pictures of a rally in the bay area.

TBoggI look at the big map and all of the red in flyover country and I feel like I've been locked in a room with the slow learners. We have become the country that pulls a dry cleaning bag over its head to play astronaut.

Barry (At www.bloggy.com)Looking at the map, it looks pretty easy for the good people to join Canada. I think we should secede, now that the majority of Americans have voted for the

* pro-torture
* prevent blacks from voting
* trust in God to tell use what to do
* pro-war
* anti-gay
* anti-abortion

party.

Isn't it interesting that it's mainly the more highly-educated states that voted for Kerry?

I think the gay marriage thing is what put them over the top. Way to move in the opposite direction of every other democracy, America.

Zito Joseph"I'm saddened by what I feel is the obtuseness and shortsightedness of a good part of the country - the heartland," Dr. Joseph said. "This kind of redneck, shoot-from-the-hip mentality and a very concrete interpretation of religion is prevalent in Bush country - in the heartland."

Jessica Johnson ''Many Americans have nothing between their ears. Americans are fat, lazy, and stupid. I don't like this country anymore."

It's not all the Democrats who are shrieking fonts of hate. Most of the mainstream lefty bloggers are disappointed with the results, but are not howling at the American Public who voted for Bush. Kevin Drum, Oliver Willis, Duncan Black, and Josh Marshall are upset, but they're not displaying that attitude of "How dare those peons vote for the smirking chimp" that the lovely examples above demonstrate. Nor are they calling for "two Americas" or claiming that "Bush is not my president" (although the comment sections at some of the blogs certainly rectify that omission). Just as we are expected to slap down Falwell and Rebertson every time they open their pie holes, the saner portions of the left need to sedate their loons.

Chaffee has faniced himself a Jeffords-style kingmaker in the senate, declaring that he was not voting for George W. Bush, and intimating that he might switch parties if Dubya won the election. However, the surprising success of the GOP in the Senate (a gain of four seats, to make it 55-44-1) means that he has no leverage now,as he'd go from being as obscure member of the majority party to an obscure member of the minority party. Additionally, it would not be unreasonable for the GOP leadership to pull his committee assignments (he is the chair of two subcommittees, Superfund/Waste Management and Near Eastern/South Asian Affairs) for his outspoken criticisms. Further, he won't have the influence Jeffords had when it comes to his pet projects (although Chaffee's projects are somewhat less parochial than those of Jeffords, focusing primarily on health research), and he is bound to find it harder to garner support from the Republican committee heads.

As a side thought, what has Jeffords done since bolting the party? I took a quick look, and he has sponsored 68 pieces of legislation in the most recent congress. However, 8 of them were amendments to this omnibus spending bill and an astonishing 24 were amendments to S14, which is the Energy Bill of 2003. He has only sponsored 16 actual pieces of legislation, none particularly noteworthy. He had his 15 minutes of fame, and he has settled into his footnote status as the only current independent in the Senate.

Judy Woodruff, on CNN, commenting on the enormous backlog of absentee ballots in South Florida, which may not be counted until Thursday, came up with an incredibly stupid and loaded statement. She stated that Democrats are grumbling and accusing Glenda Hood (Florida's GOP Secretary of State)of dragging her feet, "but that we have no evidence of that".

Glenda Hood has nothing to do with counting absentee ballots in any county. That would be the job of the county supervisors of elections. Miami/Dade and Broward have Democratic Party Supervisors, and Palm Beach's supervisor was a Democrat who changed her registration to independent after her party savaged her over the 2000 "butterfly ballot". If the Democrats are upset about the backlog of ballots, they need to look to their own, and STFU about Glenda Hood. As of yesterday morning, the Dems had already filed multiple lawsuits in Florida, in an attempt to steal the state again, just as they had in 2000.

Watching the news, I have seen reports that the exit polls have been showing a Kerry landslide. I have two thoughts on this:

1. Are these polls being conducted in big cities? Hello! We all know that Bush's support comes from the smaller towns and rural areas, not the Upper West Side or downtown Seattle or Michigan Avenue.

2. I expect to see a shift to Bush as the people who have jobs finish work and vote. As I type this, it's a little after 6 PM Eastern time, so the people in the midwest are just getting off of work, and the people in the Mountain and Pacific zones are still working.

We'll know by tomorrow morning whether or not Kerry won; we'll simply need to look at the number of lawsuits filed. If it's low, Kerry won. If it's astronomical, then Bush won.

I think We'll know tonight. At 10:30 eastern, the numbers from FL and OH are shaping up fairly solidly, and the upper midwest looks to be trending Bush.

MSM still treating OH and FL as radioactive.

Really, really obvious FL2K syndrome. The MSM folks probably wish they had Radiation Suits to cover those two states. They aren't going to call them till some chick over 450 lbs starts doing some karaoke.